Faith's English Blog

Today we had no bellringer. We read and analyzed a poem called "Im Nobody! Who are you?" by Emily Dickinson. In summary the poem was about someone (the author) who dreaded being somebody (which we interepreted as being normal). There was something else I wrote in my summary but I forgot what it was. After we read the poem, that we completed the 2022-2023 discipline test, and then left to go to our next period.

 Today we had no bellringer. We were given a green sheet that said unpopular opinion, and told to reach our hand into this basket of strips of papers. Those papers had unpopular opinions on it, and whatever opinion we got, we would use to create a statement that agrees, a statement that disagrees with it and a statement that is in the middle, or compromising between the two. After that, we were to create a paragraph explaining more on the middle/compromise statement in the way our teacher taught us for homework. My assigned unpopular opinion was that "The uninformed, uneducated, ignorant masses should not have an equal vote." which I of course disagree with. However, I put my feelings aside and completed the assignment in the way I was instructed to because this is arguementive essay practice.

Today we had no bellringer. We took notes on how to include evidence in a paragraph. Evidence is proof that comes from the text, observations, or other readings. To practice including evidence in a paragraph, we answered the question "How to stop gun violence among teens in Atlanta?" or something along those lines by writing a claim, proof, and a sentence backing up the proof in our paragraph. After doing that we turned it in. Then after several minutes, we went to the next period.

There's not much of a summary for today's class period because we did not have a lecture or a bellringer today. This was due to the fact the teacher had a sore throat. So therefore, we wrote down vocabulary words on page 11 of this red textbook, and answered questions and exercises 1, 3, and 4 in the book. After finished the assignment I used the time I had left in the period to study for my AP US History test and complete the test review. I hope I do well on the questions portion I'm going to do in 3rd period.

We didn't have a bellringer yesterday or today. We wrote logos, pathos, and ethos statement on a sheet of paper about "Why should schools fund their technology?" or something along those lines. And then we discussed how would someone appeal to little kids to not do drugs now, or when they get older, using logos pathos or ethos. After that we watched several commercials and discussed whether each one was Logos, Pathos, or Ethos. There was 15 minutes of class left after we did that, so I used some of that time to develop my daily paragraph summary for today. Then the class period ended.

Today in class we wrote notes about the components of a argument. Types of Arguements are Logos, Pathos, and Ethos. In summary, Logos is an appeal to the audience with logic, Pathos is an appeal that tries to evoke an emotion in the audience, and Ethos is an appeal that tries to persuade the audience with ethics are reason. We also learned about the 3 types of claims in a arguement: Claim of Fact, Claim of Value, and Claim of Policy. We made a cluster out of an argument in class, and sorted out which claims for agreeing or disagreeing with it were which type. Then the class period ended.

Today Mr. Reese was not here so we had a substitute fill in for him. We were assigned 8 words and told to write 15 sentences that mentioned any of those words at least once. There were exercises to complete as well. I completed those, but I think I didn't complete the vocabulary words and assignments sentence correctly. It only said the vocabulary words on page 5 so I wrote 15 sentences from 8 words. I feel like I was supposed to write about the 7 words on the back of the page but the instructions did not specify that. I'm hoping that tomorrow Mr. Rease shows up so I may be able to ask him on clarification on the assignment, and redo it if I did it incorrectly.

 

Today in class we watched a short film called "Identity" and wrote what we observed and thought about it for our bellringer. Next we revised and edited the paragraphs four of our classmates wrote and turned in our suggestions. Then we engaged in brainstorming activities where we had to write 6 ideas of what we have about a topic in a list. For example, the question "What are the benefits of playing in a team sport?" was one of the topics we brainstormed about. Then the period ended.

The short film "Identity" we watched was about a girl whose mask was different from the others. People in similar groups had similar color or similar style masks that were similar to the standard of what a face mask should look like. But she had no one whose mask was similar to hers. A part I found interesting is when one of the students of the school changed her mask to a mask that matched the group of people she was about to talk to. It is implied that she probably has different masks for talking or associating with different people or groups of people. This situation reminded me about how people act differently when they are around certain people in a location. For example, the way some people act at school is different from the way they act at home or at a party.

Today in class we did not have a bellringer. We first took a picture of our clusters and posted them to our blog. Next we reviewed the 5 steps of the writing process, which was: Prewriting, Drafting, Revising, Editing, and Presenting. After that, we wrote down the format of a body paragraph on the back of the paper with the cluster on it. The format was: Topic Sentence, Evidence, Explain Evidence, Evidence 2, Explain Evidence 2 and Conclude. Then after creating a body paragraph on how to get a job together, we created our own with the assitance of the teacher and went to our next period.

 

Today we took the test on the Langston Hughes poems because we didn't have enough time to last friday. I'm elated that I got a 100 on it, because I expected a low A or high B with the way some of my answers were unsure. I think that what helped was my utilization of the process of elimination method, a method I have been using for a couple of years now to pass tests, which was reiterated to me last week in a more detailed way. And of course, the free 5 correct answers helped as well. After taking the test, we took notes on the writing process and created a bubble map on the process of getting a job. Then class ended.

I approach writing in different ways for different types of pieces. For example, when I'm writing a argumentative essay, I first of all write all the things may know about the prompt beforehand, then create a plan on how I'm going to write the paper on one document. After that I come up with three topics to talk about in my introduction. Then I look at sources on the internet to back and extend my claims so I can find substance to my next 3 paragraphs. When I get to my conclusion, I restate my introduction and reinforce points I made in it, trying my best not to introduce new information or make the paragraph longer than it needs to. If I have any information from outside sources in my essay, I create a bibliography at the end of it.

Today we didn't have a bellringer. Since we were going to take an assessment, we were shown tips on how to take a multiple choice assessment and wrote them down. A strategy discussed these notes was the process of elimination method. Then Mr. Rease gave us some questions and called on people in the class to come up with answers to use it on. After that, we tried the process of elimination method again on 5 actual questions in the test we were going to do. However, since we had to go get our chromebooks checked in, we did not have enough time to start the assessment, and I'm assuming we will do it next week.

 Today in class we watched a film called "The Last 3 Minutes" for our bellringer. It was about a guy who was dying and seeing moments of his life flash before his eyes. After watching the video, we were asked to answer the question: "What is the purpose of life?" In my response I said the purpose of life was to enjoy it. We also started a new poem called "I, Too" by Langston Hughes. It was about him using situations and metaphors to describe the discrimination he faces in life, and when he ended the poem with "I too, am America." he meant that he hoped to be seen as an American and/or person of equal worth as everyone else in the way the people who live there are. 

I think that based on the film the purpose of life is to enjoy it. Though you are born to work until you die, there will be rest periods in life where you can enjoy it. The guy in the film had various moments in life where he enjoyed it. Such as when he got into a fight as a kid, or got engaged to someone. I think this is the message the film is trying to send to the viewers.

  Above are the annotations for the poem we read in class today "Mother to Son" by Langston Hughes. We concluded what the themes of it were, and shared what we think our mothers would say if we approached her about giving up on life. I said that she would tell me to keep going in response to that question. We were also assigned to complete discussion questions on the poem, but however I didn't finish it in class because I was still finishing up the discussion questions from the last poem "The Negro Speaks of Rivers" by Langston Hughes. I was happy I get the chance to finish it when I get home and turn it in tomorrow. 

Today we did a bellringer about good advice we've gotten from our mother but I couldn't remember any at the moment so I didn't put down anything. I did eventually remember one piece of advice she has given me but I did not have enough to say about it to write a paragraph, so I didn't put down anything. I consider my roots to be from Nigeria because my parents are Nigerian immigrants. However when the subject of english last names came up, I wondered if my grandfather may have mixed ancestry because my english last name started from him. Though it may be possible he changed it to assimilate himself into American society when he first traveled here, because I remember my mom changed her first and last name for that reason, and also because she got married to my dad with a english last name.

 I cannot remember any advice my mom has given me at the moment.

Today for our bellringer we watched a short film about a guy using elevators. Then we answered questions in a paragraph response based on what we saw. After that we did a kahoot game containing questions on facts about our teacher Mr. Reese. I look forward to winning the next kahoot so I can get a pass to skip a quiz, because quizzes under any subject of ela(? I think this class is a ela type of class), especially if it is a AP class are the most difficult of all. And lastly, we completed a pre-assessment for the class and then left to go to the next period.

I found it strange how the guy in the blue shirt magically knew each of the weights of the people in the first elevator. What I liked about the film was that it had high quality. One theme of the film is that escaping from an unfortunate situation with others without helping them doesn't always mean you'll end up in a better one. This is a result of karma. Another theme of the film could be to be aware of your surroundings. I feel like the guy in the blue shirt should have told the two heaviest guys in the elevator to politely transfer to another one because of the weight limit. But if he did, he would become suspicious of him and ask "how do you know?", which would ruin the fact that the video is without dialogue.

I  was not able to attend school today due to personal reasons, so I do not have feedback on any activities completed in class today.

1. Faith Emmanuel 2. I'm not sure what I want to do for a career yet 3. Sleeping, eating, watching shows 4. I can't pick a favorite artist because I have a lot of them 5. I don't have anything interesting about myself 6. Zaxby's chicken sandwich and fries with buffalo sauce and ranch 7. Italy and France because I want to taste the pastas, bread, and chocolate